


Love Excels

by Dira Sudis (dsudis)



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Spreadsheets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-10 20:57:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12920094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsudis/pseuds/Dira%20Sudis
Summary: Writing his thesis had Eric thinking about finishing his thesis, and thengraduation, and thenwhatever he was going to do with his life after graduation.





	Love Excels

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nevermindedanyway](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nevermindedanyway/gifts).



> Thanks to staranise, Stultiloquentia, and Ylixia for their help with this!
> 
> Happy holidays, nevermindedanyway! I hope you enjoy this story. :)

He'd been picking away at the topic for most of the week he'd been at Jack's, having a fall break staycation in his boyfriend's apartment. The Falconers were on a home stand, so they actually got to see each other and sleep in the same place every night, which was really all Eric wanted from his break anyway. Well, that and finishing this chapter of his thesis before he lost his next progress bet with Jack, but he was actually in pretty good shape there.

Of course, thinking about writing his thesis had him thinking about finishing his thesis, and then _graduation_ , and then _whatever he was going to do with his life after graduation_.

"I just worry, if I do baking professionally--or culinary school--then that's going to take so much of the joy of it away, you know? And ramping up my YouTube channel would be the same, really, except also... sterile, I guess? Because the product is how I look and sound making the food, not necessarily the food itself. Not that I wouldn't be able to share the food with people, Lord knows, it's not like I have any problem with that. 

"I guess with YouTube I could widen out my focus--hockey commentary, maybe?--so it wouldn't have to be all baking all the time, and it would definitely be a lot less _volume_ than a bakery or culinary school. And I could do that literally anywhere, but there's no guarantee that I'd be able to get into serious ad revenue territory--and maybe getting really into all that scheduling and keyword hyping and everything would take all the joy out of that? And that could get real sticky if we get outed..."

Eric looked over at Jack, who had, of course, heard all of this debate a hundred times already. He was frowning into his laptop, but when Eric trailed off, he looked up and smiled crookedly as he said, "Everything's gonna be affected if we get outed, bud."

Eric blew out a breath and went back to folding himself backward over the arm of the couch. "Yeah, but... well, I guess a bakery, yeah, that's vulnerable to public opinion? But the bakery would be more the products, the business, than selling... _me_ , you know? But I guess if it's mine, personally, then it's still gonna be affected that way, yeah."

He and Jack weren't planning to come out on _purpose_ anytime too soon, but they weren't guarding against it as hard as humanly possible, either, and there was no sense ignoring the likelihood that it would happen sometime in the next year or two.

There might be an upside to his celebrity connection, in terms of YouTube hits or getting the name of his bakery out in the world, but Eric refused to bank on that. Not just because it might not work out that way, but because it made him feel like a particularly awful kind of gold digger to think that way. Jack was happy to buy him things, way more than Eric could stand to let him, but he didn't want to think of benefiting from something that cost Jack privacy and peace of mind. Jack had a lot less of either of those than he had money, and they mattered to him infinitely more.

Eric went on thinking aloud, raising one leg to point his toes at the ceiling as he did. "So if I'm looking at stuff where I'm just... a person doing a job... then that's culinary school and a restaurant job, or looking into social media on the professional side, or... something else. Coaching on the figure skating side, nobody'd care if I was out, and I could maybe get an assistant spot with an established coach... ugh, early mornings, though. But plenty of time for baking, I guess, and I could keep baking as something that's just fun. Hockey coaching... that's probably _right_ out."

Jack made a vague agreeing noise, and Eric glanced in his direction, though he couldn't see Jack at all from this angle. He couldn't really blame Jack if he'd completely tuned out at this point. Eric's mouth was practically on autopilot, he'd chased his tail around these questions so many times--but that didn't mean Eric couldn't chirp him. 

"I guess I could go for a PhD and write a whole book about pie. 'Course grad students don't make much money, but maybe I could try out for one of the ECHL teams. Play hockey on the weekends for minor league minimum, spend the rest of the week in the library and baking--I guess that's just signing up for another four or five years of college, but it sounds more impressive, right? Professional college." 

Jack's typing speed increased while Eric tried to think of another ridiculous possibility--joining the circus? Doing performance art on Boston Common for spare change? He brought his leg down and raised the other. Maybe he could learn to be a yoga instructor? 

Jack said, "You might have to take a year off, you didn't take the GRE yet and the deadlines are coming up." 

Eric frowned up at his pointing toes. Deadlines for... yoga instruction? He hadn't even said that out loud. He pulled himself back up to where he could see Jack. "I'd what?" 

Jack looked up from the laptop, blinking a little as he refocused, like he'd been deep in tape review. He turned the laptop to show one browser window and a half-dozen spreadsheet grids, which seemed to be color-coded. 

"You haven't talked about the PhD/ECHL option before," Jack explained. "I was plugging it into the grid, but there would have to be some lead time, because you haven't taken the GRE or applied to any programs yet. You could probably start the ECHL part next fall, though, maybe take some extra classes or get started on your research during the gap year." 

"I..." Eric stared at him. "Jack, I'm not going to get a PhD. I'm barely keeping my 3.0 for athletic eligibility." 

Jack shrugged. "I mean, I guess that's something to consider. You want me to add a column for likelihood of success?" 

"A... column..?" Eric leaned closer, squinting at the laptop, and Jack scooted toward him, repositioning so Eric could look over his shoulder while he typed. 

He'd made a grid--he'd made a half-dozen grids, like the ones they'd done on the chalkboards when Jack was picking a team. All the stuff Eric had been rambling about for days; Jack hadn't just been listening, he'd been trying to make sense of it. 

Jack clicked over to a color-coded list headed _PRIORITIES_ , and started typing in _Probability of Success_ under _Proximity to Jack_. 

"Wait, why is Proximity to Jack way at the bottom like that?" Eric demanded. "That should be way higher up!" 

"Well, you didn't say particularly," Jack said, but he obediently, and somewhat laboriously, cut and pasted that line to move it up to third behind _Opportunities to Bake_ and _Safe if Outed_. 

"Jack," Eric said, absorbing what he was looking at. "You... You're trying to help me figure this out." 

"Well, somebody's got to," Jack said, like it was nothing, like he didn't have a game in three hours for his NHL team who were in the hunt for a playoff spot again this year. Like he had nothing better to do than actually listen to every silly word Eric said. 

"I was doing all the grids by hand, but that was taking forever, so I got Rans to send me his auto-weighting template. I've been working out what the variables are and how much they matter to you from what you talk about. Excel really likes this PhD idea so far, Bits, you should think about it some more. Maybe Brown has a program?" 

"I'm not getting a PhD at _Brown_ ," Eric said, except he was already thinking about more school that was nothing but the parts of school he liked the best--maybe even doing some teaching, or tutoring at least, he did love teaching--and living here with Jack, walking over to campus, going to Jack's games... 

No one would care if a PhD student was gay, or had a famous athlete boyfriend. And if they got outed the people who did care would know he was a graduate student, which had to be the very opposite of a gold digger, literal or figurative. 

"Professor Atley would probably write me a recommendation, though," Eric said, staring into the spreadsheet while Jack tapped at something on his phone. 

"GRE study guide will be at the Haus by the time you get back," Jack announced, which Eric knew meant that _five_ study guides would be there. 

"Jack, you don't actually think I could do a PhD, do you?" He couldn't. Could he? He wasn't actually good at school, not really. Although he might be if he got to write an entire book about pie at the end. Maybe? 

Jack looked up at him, smiling a little. "I think you can do anything, Bits. And you definitely ought to get to try everything." Glancing down at the spreadsheets, he went on, "If more school isn't your thing, you can open a bakery instead, or get a social media job. Or do some coaching on the side instead of trying out for an ECHL team. And you can YouTube everything anyway." 

"You..." Eric shook his head. He couldn't doubt that Jack meant it, that he actually believed it. He wanted to help no matter what Eric wanted to do, no matter where it took him. "What am I gonna do with you, Mr. Zimmermann?" 

Jack gave him a sly sideways look and said, "I dunno, Bits, but we've got a solid forty-five minutes before I have to take a nap. Want to show me those stretches again?" 

"Oh, hey, put down _yoga instructor_ ," Eric said, leaning in for a kiss. 

Somehow, without being able to see the screen, Jack actually did, although Eric didn't notice that until much later.


End file.
